/**
 * Copyright (c) 2011 Roundarch (www.roundarch.com)
 *
 * Author Joshua Jung
 *
 * ---
 *
 * Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy
 * of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal
 * in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights
 * to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell
 * copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is
 * furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:
 *
 * The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in
 * all copies or substantial portions of the Software.
 *
 * THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR
 * IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY,
 * FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE
 * AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER
 * LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM,
 * OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN
 * THE SOFTWARE.
 */
package com.roundarch.flex.controls.graphControlInterfaces
{
    import flash.events.IEventDispatcher;

    /**
     * An interval is the distance between two values. However, intervals can be complicated
     * where the distance between two values depends on one of the values (like the lenght of
     * a month or a year).Also, intervals may be required to start on a particular value and end
     * on a particular value. This class provides the functionality to create a generic interval
     * collection, or a set of various intervals.
     *
     * For example, you could have an interval collection that contains IInterval objects for each
     * month of the year (where obviously each interval needs a different length).
     *
     * @author jjung
     */
    public interface IIntervalCollection extends IEventDispatcher
    {
        //---------------------------------------------------------------------
        //
        //  Methods
        //
        //---------------------------------------------------------------------
        /**
         * Returns the interval in which the provided value lies.
         *
         * If the provided value does not lie in an interval represented by the class,
         * then this should return null.
         */
        function getIntervalFor(value : Number) : IInterval;

        /**
         * Returns an Array of all the interval that lie between the the start and end value, inclusive.
         */
        function getIntervalsFor(startValue : Number, endValue : Number) : Array;

        /**
         * Should return true once the interval has bene fully initialized.
         */
        function get ready() : Boolean;
    }
}
